If you would like to nominate a Volunteer member for this
recognition, send a note explaining who and why to
. If you would like to volunteer for the chapter, contact
.

2018

3Q18 - Patricia Young

As a volunteer on the Symposium Team since January 2018, Patricia Young has demonstrated outstanding initiative working with Symposium VPs and team members to develop and manage detailed project work plans for both the 2018 Symposium events. She helped develop new project schedules, and used them most recently to organize and run efficient weekly meetings, monitor progress, and report status to ensure successful delivery of the 2018 IPM Day program.

In addition to managing the work plans, scheduling meetings, notifying participants, leading team calls, taking minutes and following up on deliverables and action items, Patricia showed exceptional initiative in helping to streamline the meeting process by restructuring the calls, sending update requests prior to the meeting, and having each team provide focused status summaries for their group’s pending deliverables.

Patricia assumed additional responsibility for supporting the Symposium Speaker team in speaker funnel management and upates, and made a significant contribution to finalizing the IPM Day meeting agenda by identifying a key speaker candidate, and then qualifying, negotiating, and shepherding the speaker through the Symposium Speaker Agreement process.

Congratulations to Patricia Young, Volunteer of the 3rd quarter 2018.

1Q18 - Kathy Contratto

Kathy has been volunteering as part of the Membership Retention Initiative since March 2014. Every month she faithfully makes calls to members to encourage them to renew their PMI memberships. That's over 50 months of making the calls. Recently Kathy has also been volunteering as a leader with the New Member Orientation Program. When our new members attend a monthly chapter meeting, Kathy is one of the volunteers who present an overview of the Chapter. Her enthusiasm about the Chapter is contagious. Kathy's previous volunteering experience with the Chapter was in another area dear to her heart, working with Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts from 2012 to 2015 to recognize Gold and Eagle Scouts and to introduce them to PMINJ.

Kathy joined PMINJ in June 2011, shortly after receiving her PMP certification. She is currently a Director with RSM Consulting. Please join me in congratulating Kathy as our latest Volunteer of the Quarter.

2Q18 - Sunil Dubey

Sunil has been a PMI member since 2004 and joined the PMINJ Chapter in 2013. He has been a chapter volunteer since 2015. During the past 3 years, he has supported the chapter activities in many roles.

As an Email Author with the Marketing team, Sunil is responsible for authoring emails that are distributed to the PMINJ members and guests. Often, these emails are created with a very tight deadline. The data for the emails comes from the content on the website or other sources. Sunil brings his own brand of creativity to make the emails more interesting to the target audience. Over the past 3 years, he has introduced many improvements to the email templates to help make the look and feel more contemporary. In this effort, he is helped by his keen eye for detail and good understanding of the tools at his disposal.

Sunil is associated with the Professional Development team as a Mentor since January 2016. Sunil uses his 20+ years of project management experience in the IT field to impart project management insights to up-and-coming project managers and help them succeed in their careers.

In addition, Sunil has been a member of the Annual Volunteer Recognition Dinner team, contributing to success of 2016 and 2018 events.

When Sunil is not volunteering for PMINJ events, he is an IT Project Manager with IEEE in Piscataway. He is deeply involved with local youth development programs as an Advisor to the Edison Visionary Leo Club, guiding the youth club members to manage community service projects through application of project management principles and tools. As a volunteer, he also helps manage HindiUSA's Edison Hindi School branch, which has over 500 students.

2017

Volunteer of the Year 2017 - Cyndi
Wilson

Cyndi Wilson has been a volunteer with our chapter since the
beginning !

She is one of the founding members of the Member Services
team when we launched in 2014. Prior to
joining Member Services, Cyndi was a consistent and regular
presence at on site registration ensuring members received a
warm greeting and received timely responses to any
questions. Cyndi excels at customer
service and continues to volunteer for both Member
Services as well as Onsite Registration. This
presents a seamless experience for our members.
Cyndi is reliable, customer oriented and dedicated to making
PMINJ the organization of choice for PMs in NJ !

2Q17 - Yosra Badr

Yosra Badr’s key contribution to PMINJ in 2016: She
completed the update of PMINJ’s Operations Manual (also
known as the VP Handbook). The Operations Manual is the
linchpin of PMINJ’s documentation portfolio, because it
contains the information required to run PMINJ
(Administration, Programs, Finance, Membership, Marketing,
Professional Development, Business Relationships,
Outreach, Symposium, Recognition, and President/Past
President). It documents roles, responsibilities, and
scope of work decomposed to the detailed work breakdown
structures. It is intended to be used by the VPs and
Directors to help them manage their teams, and as a
transition guide for volunteers.

This was a very challenging project for Yosra because it
was incomplete as of the beginning of 2016, with only two
areas updated in 2015. Yosra brought great enthusiasm and
energy to revitalize this project, along with high degree
of persistence and attention to detail. The project plan
required Yosra to frequently reach out to the VPs and
their Directors to obtain from them the rough draft of
their specific area’s manual. She then edited the manual
to insure it conformed with pre-determined PMINJ
Board-approved standards and template. On behalf of PMINJ,
please join me in congratulating Yosra on doing such a
excellent job, and thank her for being a PMINJ volunteer
on the Administration team!

4Q17 - Mani Palaniyandi

Mani has been a solid member of the
pre-registration team.

He is the volunteer who produces the various lists for
the onsite registration teams in advance of the
chapter meetings. He is
diligent and incredibly reliable. Our team has never
failed to deliver the registration sheets to the on
site registration team with Mani as the facilitator of
this process. Thanks to Mani, the on site
registration team is fully ready to serve the members
who attend the monthly chapter
meetings. His dedication and
reliablity is greatly appreciated.

2016

Volunteer of the Year 2016 - Suzanne
Walsh

Suzanne has been a committed volunteer with PMINJ more than
10 years. While juggling serious family obligations
over the years, with her leadership, the registration team
has organized its processes and prodedures so well that the
team work looks effortless. Though the responsibility is
a large one, Suzannes team does not fail. Regisration
runs smoothly.

Any issues that arise are handled seamlessly within the
registration team, so that you would never know there was
ever an issue. Suzanne and her team routinely takes
ownership and handls issues that arise on site during
events.

Suzanne is always ready to give input and is available
regularly to the Symposium Team. When it comes to reviewing
materials and giving solid / sage / knowledgable feedback on
Symposium issues, Suzanne can be depended on.
Suzanne’s demeanor also makes her very easy to work with.

1Q16 - Laura Pinto

Laura has been an active volunteer of the
Symposium Registration Team for more than 10 years.
Laura can be counted on not only to do a great job with
her specific area of responsibility (preparing the
certificates for the attendees, vendors, & speakers)
but she regularly offers her time to help make the overall
event registration process more efficient.

With a smile on her face, Laura works at
the registration table for the symposium and makes
registration experience pleasant for the attendees. Laura
is always willing to pitch in and help to coordinate the
registration activities when needed. On multiple
occasions, she came to the rescue for the registration
team, when a team member could not attend the event due to
a personal emergency. Laura regularly provides suggestions
for improvements for the registration process and shares
her ideas during the Symposium Lessons Learned
session. Laura always goes the extra mile to help
our chapter members and other volunteers. The success of
PMINJ's symposium and other chapter events is attributed
to the volunteers like Laura.

2Q16 - Kristin Hopp

Kristin Hopp took over scholarship
renewals two years ago and she has kept participation up
through her diligent follow-up and answering the students
and parents questions. Recognizing right away that
students have a lot on their plates, she implemented a
process that gently reminds students before applications
are due in February / March by sending a link to the new
application and including deadlines. When it is time
to send grades, she sends a reminder and copies the
parents. This has increased renewal participation
significantly. Kristin has stepped up to a difficult
challenge of declining renewal numbers. Please
congratulate her for a job well done.

3Q16 - Max Abrams

Max has provided a pivotal role as Speaker
Angel and now has moved up to Speaker Team Lead. He has
gone above and beyond in all phases of soliticing,
researching, negotiating and working closely with the
speakers for the symposium as needed. He has volunteered
to substitute for other angels on last minute cancelation
and ensure the success of the symposium. He works well
with the speakers and symposium team to ensure strong
communications which has led to our successful planning
and execution of our biannual symposium events. His
leadership and commitment have had a strong impact on the
success of our speaker and symposium team.

4Q16 - Claudia
Campbell-Matland

Claudia has forged new relationships
between PMINJ and both the BioPharma Research Council
(BRC) and BioNJ. The BRC held an event in November
that was attended by several chapter members. Our
Outreach Speaker – Michael Sarachman was provided a
platform to evangelize for the Chapter in both a Training
Session and as part of a Panel discussion that Claudia
moderated. The Chapter was also provided free table
space at the exhibitors area where we were positioned
right next to Mercer County Community College which has
indicated interest in an alliance with PMINJ.
Claudia spoke before employees of Musculoskeletal
Transplant Foundation in Edison on Dec 14th. She is
a volunteer who’s active in the monthly calls and can be
relied upon to get things done for the Outreach team.

2015

Volunteer of the Year 2015 - Harry
Chiovarou

For over 12 years, Harry has been the A/V
professional for PMINJ, working tirelessly to ensure high
quality technical support for every presentation at each
event. He has managed the Chapter’s capability to
present at each monthly meeting, Seminar, Symposium, and IPM
day. Initially the responsibilities ‘only’ included
working with the vendors at each of the venues for our
events. He has been responsible for the quality of the
speaker audio and the presentation of the speaker
materials. Harry will test all of the speaker
presentations prior to each event to assure that there are
no technical issues that might occur during the
presentation. Just think, for the Symposium alone,
that is at least 13 presentations.

Then in 2007, the Chapter broadened the scope of our
events. We introduced satellite meeting locations and
increased the A/V requirements exponentially. Now
Harry was extending the A/V capabilities of the events to
locatiions via phone and internet so that members could
participate remotely in real time. A secondary benefit
for this arrangement was the capability to create Webinars
that could be viewed after the event.

Over the years, the A/V technology has changed, and
Harry has been the guiding force to ensure PMINJ has been
able to maintain our capabiilities to provide members the
ability to participate in our events. He has
identified new equipment to increase quality and has
investigated and implemented new processes to improve
efficiency. Harry has assisted with vendor changes in
webinar technology, and is constantly investigating new
technology that would make the events better for the
participants and the future viewers of the webinars.
He has mentored new A/V team volunteers and has even
collaborated with other Chapters to help them setup similar
satellite webcasts for their meetings.

In all of this, Harry has been the perfect example of a
PMINJ Volunteer. He is always available and willing to
help. A dedicated professional, Harry always
demonstrates the highest standards of quality and
leadership! PMINJ deeply appreciates Harry’s
commitment, and is pleased to present him the 2015 Barbara
Ann Fuller Volunteer of the Year award,

1Q15 - Tod Burrus

Tod has been the “bedrock” volunteer for the
Corporate Outreach Team. He has been PMINJ's ambassador
and a project management evangelist at many of our
Outreach events- handing out brochures, giving advice and
(when available) candy to the people who stop by our PMINJ
information tables.

Tod’s smiling face and easy manner of speaking with people
have been key elements in spreading the word about the
importance of project management as a profession and about
the benefits and opportunities that PMINJ provides to
members. As we have continued to reach out to project
manager communities in corporations, universities,
state and local governments, and other professional
organizations, we’ve always been able to count on Tod to
volunteer and be present to represent PMINJ.

When Tod is not volunteering for PMINJ events, he is
a Business Development Manager for Analysts International
Corporation (AIC) in Edison, NJ.

2Q15 - Jerry Meier

Jerry Meier has been volunteering as a
member of PMINJ Programs On-Site Registration activities
since November, 2011, when he joined the team led by
Dennis Komsa. As a dedicated team member with
detailed knowledge of the On-Site Registration process,
Jerry agreed to take the Team Leader role when Dennis
stepped down in June, 2013. Since then, Jerry has
worked tirelessly to recruit, train, organize and manage a
team of volunteers who welcome members and guests at
PMINJ Programs’ Monthly Chapter Meetings.

Each month, Jerry coordinates with his team
members to develop a schedule to ensure full coverage of
the registration table; obtains and copies meeting
handouts; manages attendance tracking and reporting at the
Main Meeting location; and verifies accurate headcount
numbers for the dinner meeting bill. He also helps
facilitate sponsor and outreach activity logistics.
Always ready and willing to tackle new challenges to
improve the registration process, Jerry worked with John
Bufe to pilot and deploy automated walk-in registrations
via smartphone and has helped streamline attendance
tracking using Google docs.

An efficient, organized Team Leader, Jerry
can be relied on to ensure On-Site Registration runs
smoothly, and should be recognized for his longstanding
support of PMINJ as a volunteer and Programs On-Site
Registration Team Leader.

3Q15 - Alvin Chingcuanco

Alvin joined the Marketing team in March
2015 focusing on improving our social media
presence. Over the last few months, Alvin has made
significant contributions to our social media sites
including postings on Facebook, LinkedIn and
Twitter. These postings have helped increase
attendance at various chapter meetings and
workshops. Over the summer, he led an initiative
with students at Montclair State University to create a
social media strategy and calendar of postings for our new
chapter year. With very limited supervision, he
managed three student teams to create a social media
strategy and identify content for these sites in six
weeks. He is now managing two volunteers to
coordinate regular content updates.

Alvin was also instrumental in updating our chapter
brochure. He took the lead in facilitiating the
necessary meetings to collect content from our board
members and redesigned the brochure with a new format and
graphics. Alvin is a Project Manager / Office
Manager for NBP Holdings Group and an academic tutor at
DeVry University Paramus Campus.

He is completing his MBA with concentration in Project
Management at DeVry’s Keller Graduate School of
Management.

4Q15 - Dennis Ryan

When you attend PMINJ’s monthly programs or
symposium, you will almost always find Dennis Ryan at the
audio/visual (A/V) table, testing A/V equipment before the
event, monitoring activities, or going around the audience
with a microphone so everybody can hear questions
attendees are asking the speaker. PMINJ would like
to recognize Dennis as Volunteer of the Quarter for his
years of dedicated service, strong leadership, teamwork,
and attention to details to ensure that chapter events are
successful.

Dennis joined the Chapter A/V team as a
volunteer in 2009. He has now successfully supported more
than 10 major symposiums and more than 50 monthly
meetings. Every facility has different challenges in terms
of ensuring that the speaker can be seen and heard by
everyone in the audience. As part of the A/V team, Dennis
is responsible for soliciting, selecting, managing, and
working with the A/V subcontractors for the monthly
meetings, annual symposium and IPM day events. Dennis
helps set up A/V equipment on the day of the monthly
meetings or a day before the big symposiums. He works with
speakers to make sure they are comfortable with the
microphone, video screen, moving presentation on the
chapter laptop and music for the event. Dennis can always
be relied on to keep his cool during emergencies like
equipment malfunctions or unforeseen speaker requests.
Over the years, Dennis has shown leadership, patience,
perseverance, adherence to the highest standards of
quality, and, yes Dennis brings good music and cheer for
the event!

Dennis began his project management career
while working for a contract manufacturing firm in the
mid-1980's. He was responsible for a number of
projects relating to new product launches and seasonal
promotions for the personal care industry. He was
eventually hired by one of his customers to become the
internal manager for similar activities. In 1998 he
jumped to the pharmaceutical industry and has been with
Bristol-Myers Squibb for the last 10 years. He works
in R&D on different medicines going through the
development and clinical trial processes. If a
medicine doesn't get eliminated along the way (and most
do), it takes upwards of 10 years to bring a new product
to market and that is a long, complex and expensive
project.

Dennis earned his PMP in 2006 and joined PMINJ immediately
to enhance his expertise, get the most out his
certification and begin networking with other project
management professionals.

Dennis' AV experience goes back many decades to when he
was the student AV leader for his high school and
continues today through his volunteer work for several
organizations. His interest has been encouraged over
the years by having the opportunity to volunteer to work
side-by-side with one of the most successful rock bands in
history (and a member of the R&R Hall of Fame Class of
2016).

After admiring Harry Chiovarou's sole handling of the
chapter's AV services from a distance for a few months,
Dennis offered his assistance - which was warmly and
gratefully received. Dennis is very pleased to work
with Harry and serve PMINJ at the monthly meetings,
Seminar / Symposiums and IPM Days for many years now and
looks forward to doing what he can to support and help the
organization grow. PMINJ's success is attributed to
volunteers like Dennis, who work tirelessly to provide
quality programs for the chapter members and we thank him
for that. Please stop-by at A/V table at monthly meetings
or at symposium and thank Dennis for his years of
contribution to successfully managing A/V for the chapter
events!

2014

Volunteer of the Year 2014 - Diane
Dugan

Diane Dugan PMP, LEED AP, was awarded the most
prestigious award of the PMINJ chapter, the Barbara Ann
Fuller Volunteer of the Year award, at the Volunteer
Recognition Dinner on 06 February, 2015.

Diane is the consummate professional,
photographer and volunteer. Diane was even working her own
celebratory event as PMINJ’s photographer! Diane attends
most if not all PMINJ events; from monthly Program meetings,
mid-size workshops to the large Symposium events. Diane uses
her talent to memorialize these chapter events.

Diane leads the Photography Team for the
events, organizing photography activities, assuring coverage
of speakers and vendors, and the post event gathering and
finalizing of all photos for media and website release, with
finesse. The Symposium events are especially demanding with
multiple breakout rooms, 100’s of photos captured and
subsequently sorted and edited. In this way Diane shares her
talents and further reveals her commitment and her art to
the PMINJ chapter.

Diane is a joy to work with and the PMINJ
chapter is grateful for her continued commitment to our
chapter; thank you Diane!

1Q14 - Mike Vitale

Mike Vitale volunteered in February 2013.
Mike immediately adopted the vision of bringing PM
knowledge into schools [k-12]. He started researching
PMIEF [PMI Education Foundation] to see what other
chapters were doing and what materials were available. He
developed a small team and begin putting together a PMINJ
custom presentation. They adopted the concept of working
with students that were tasked to lead a project. This led
to the connection with the Scouts in particular; the Gold
and Eagle scout program and to schools involved in FIRST
Robotics competition. They presented to a Boy Scout troop
in November 2013, shortly followed up with a presentation
in December 2013 to the Piscataway High School Robotics
Team. To assist after the PM presentation Mike’s team
designated a mentor to work with the team. The team is
also working with the Hillsborough High School Robotics
team.

2Q14 - Pamela Kunz

Pamela Kunz assumed the position of project
manager for the 2014 Chapter Excellence Awards initiative
with a minimal knowledge about the program, but she hit
the ground running. Pam quickly reviewed all the available
documentation, reached out to the Board members and was
able to fully grasp the project requirements.

When global PMI published the Chapter
Excellence application, Pam conducted a gap analysis,
collaborated with many people, and was able to quickly
gather information supporting PMINJ’s 2013
accomplishments. This was a big challenge since the
categories being measured and the requirements for
submitting documentation had changed dramatically from the
prior year.

Pam went above and beyond to ensure
requirements were understood and adhered to by the PMINJ
Board members and she provided the insight and detailed
work involved in demonstrating the quantifiable and
measurable results. Under strict time constraints, Pam
spent countless hours completing the new requirements.
“Her dedication is inspirational,” one board member noted.
“She even fills in at the registration desk at monthly
meetings … she takes her work at PMINJ very seriously.”

We look forward to keeping Pam on in a new
role—PM-Chapter Excellence, which she initiated by
carefully identifying lessons learned and ways we can act
upon them to continue to provide excellent service to our
members!

3Q14 - Anand Shanmugam

Anand is one of the founding members of the
newly formed Member Service Center. He joined in April to
help develop the initial launch of the Member Services
Team. He was a strong contributor in the development and
organization of our Member Service page on the chapter
website. He assumed responsibility for Member Services
during our peak period of new program year colliding with
website challenges. He escalated issues quickly and stayed
on the task through to resolution. He demonstrated and
continues to demonstrate a commitment to our members to
provide exceptional customer service.

4Q14 - Adrienne Walcott

Adrienne Walcott joined the Volunteer
Recognition team in March 31, 2014. In this very short
time of volunteering, Adrienne has gone above and beyond
the expectation for her role as Volunteer Coordinator.
After training, Adrienne learned the VRMS system and
efficiently manages it as coordinator for the PMINJ
chapter. In this role she manages volunteer engagements,
tracks volunteer opportunities and application, updates
VRMS database and Master Volunteer list, sends
communication to new members of Volunteer teams, trains
applicants in VRMS database and responds to any email
questions received to volunteers@pminj.org.

She thoroughly enjoys her role as Volunteer
Coordinator. When she made a list of reasons to stay in
New Jersey or move to Arizona, this was one of the top
reason why she chose to stay in New Jersey. When she is
not volunteering, she takes violin lessons and plays in an
orchestra.

Her dedication is unmatched and she is very
pleasant to work with.

2013

1Q13 - Dan Ackerman

Dan is one of the exceptional PMINJ
volunteers on the Programs Team, and currently the Team
Co-Leader for Venue Management. Dan, along with his
Co-Leader Marc Matrulli, is responsible for the great
facilities and excellent meals PMINJ members enjoy at the
Monthly Meetings. Dan started volunteering for Programs
with the On-Site Registration team in 2009, and is still
one of the many faces you may see behind the registration
desk at the Main Location.

As Venue Management Co-Lead, even before the
Program year begins, Dan is hard at work evaluating
facilities and negotiating the contracts with venues to
host the Main Location monthly chapter meetings. Venues
must be able to meet not only PMINJ’s requirements for
space and technical specifications (presentation delivery
and broadcast to satellite locations); they must also
provide excellent dinners at competitive rates.

In the weeks before each Monthly Meeting,
Dan starts coordinating with the other Programs Teams and
with the Venue to make sure the facilities and
accommodations are in order. He makes sure the Audio team
has the connectivity in place and all is functioning or
are getting the necessary support. He also makes sure that
the PMO and Networking LCI teams have what they need to
run their respective pre-meeting events.

On the day of the meeting, Dan works with
the venue's event manager to make sure tables are set as
expected, food is correct and plentiful, and everything
operates according to plan. He is the gracious host
throughout the evening, making sure that last-minute
logistics are addressed, and all the guests are enjoying
themselves. At the end of the meeting, he obtains the
final count from the On-Site Registration team and works
with the venue contact to review the invoice, making sure
the Chapter is billed correctly and sometimes negotiating
further discounts before providing approval for the
Chapter to make payment.

The smooth execution each month is just
another example of Dan’s skill as a PM. When not playing
the role of Programs Meeting Venue-Meister, he works at
Morgan Stanley supporting Morgan Stanley Wealth
Management, where he recently completed work on a three
year effort to integrate Smith Barney's suite of Corporate
Equity business applications into the Morgan Stanley
environment. As Program Manager, Dan managed the Program
Office and his team's linkage with the rest of the firm's
integration efforts.

A PMI, PMINJ member and PMP since 2005, Dan
plays a critical role as a volunteer and Co-Team Leader
for PMINJ’s Monthly Chapter Meetings. When asked what he
liked about volunteering for PMINJ, Dan said, “I like all
of it. It is great to be able to interact with so many
people across PMINJ and be part of the success of our
monthly chapter meetings.”

To run successfully and give the best
service to its members, PMINJ relies on the help of
dedicated, hard-working volunteers like Dan. We appreciate
Dan’s commitment and energy, and extend sincere thanks to
him for his valued contribution to the PM community.

2Q13 - Marc Matrulli

Marc Matrulli is one of our most dedicated
volunteers on the PMINJ Programs Team, and is the Team
Co-Leader for the Programs Venue Management Team. Marc,
along with his Co-Leader Dan Ackerman, is responsible for
identifying venues for our monthly chapter meetings,
negotiating contracts, and managing the relationships with
each facility to ensure they deliver the best service to
PMINJ attendees.

A project manager for over 15 years, Marc
joined PMINJ in 2006 when his role at Johnson &
Johnson included training on PM practices. Marc earned his
PMP in 2007, knowing the credential would help give him
the credibility his role required. The strategy worked,
and Marc is currently responsible for IT Portfolio
Strategy and Process at Johnson & Johnson.

Marc has been a volunteer on the Programs
Venue Management team since 2010. He is a gracious host
and the Programs Team relies on Marc to work with the
meeting facilities staff. A recent example of Marc’s
dedication and initiative was his work with the staff at
the Pines Manor after Hurricane Sandy to make sure all
systems were “Go” for the November Chapter meeting. Like
many other businesses, the Pines had lost power and
suffered some damage due to the storm, and Marc stayed in
close contact with the facility to ensure they’d be back
in service in time for the meeting.

Marc plays a vital role as a volunteer and
Team Co-Leader for PMINJ’s Programs Monthly Chapter
meetings. When asked why he volunteers and what he enjoys
about his role, Marc said, “It allows me to leverage my
Project Management skills and to interact with all the
other Program Team volunteers that work so hard to make
each Chapter meeting such a success.”

PMINJ Programs relies on the help of
dedicated, talented volunteers like Marc to deliver
successful Program Chapter meetings and provide valuable
professional development opportunities to the members. We
appreciate Marc’s commitment, energy, and professionalism
and thank him sincerely for his valued contribution to the
PMINJ community.

3Q13 - Gary Barrett

Gary is one of two people that distribute
all email blast communications to the chapter. The email
blasts are required to go out in a timely fashion. One
added duty that the two volunteers have is to respond to
all emails from anyone that receives these email blasts.
The questions they receive are quite varied.

Gary earned his PMP in November 2006. He
joined PMINJ in May of 2011 and became a volunteer for the
Marketing team in February of 2012. Before taking this
role any questions from our members responding to the
email blasts were not answered which would lead to member
dissatisfaction. Gary has answered questions from our
membership on a variety of subjects. To answer the
questions many times he would have to find the correct
person within the chapter to answer the question or figure
out on his own how a process worked and give the member an
answer. He responds to questions in a timely manner
because many are time sensitive when they relate to
registration. His role has provided a great insight into
the obstacles our members encounter. Another important
part of this role is to get the feedback to specific VP
areas so that they can respond to the issue at hand.
Basically this role has provided an effective feedback
loop from our members to the chapter.

4Q13 - Steve Tasker

Steve is one of two people on the Marketing
team that distributes all email blast communications to
the chapter. All email blasts are required to go out in a
timely fashion. One added duty that the two volunteers
have is to respond to all email inquiries about the email
blasts. The questions they receive are quite varied.

Before taking this role, any questions from
our membership regarding the email blasts went unanswered
which lead to member dissatisfaction. Steve has answered
questions from our membership on a variety of subjects. To
answer the questions, many times he would have to find the
correct person in the chapter to provide insight or figure
out on his own how a process worked and give the member an
answer. He responds to questions in a timely manner
because many are time-sensitive when they relate to
registration. His role has provided a great insight into
the obstacles our members encounter. Another important
part of this role is to transmit the feedback to specific
VP areas so that they can respond to the issue. Steve’s
role has provided an effective feedback loop from our
members into the chapter.

Steve completed the Penn State Certification
Program in March 2009. He joined PMINJ on 10/10/2007and
became a volunteer for the Marketing team on 2/29/2012.

2012

1Q12 - Morris Wrubel

Morris’s focus on IT Project Management
came as a natural evolution during his 20+ years in data
center, computer, and Help Desk support. His skill in
leading teams and working with technology are key
ingredients to his success leading the PMINJ Programs’
rapidly growing Satellite Team. His team is comprised of a
network of over 25 members statewide, and they coordinate
with the Programs’ A/V Team to broadcast the monthly
programs to fifteen remote meeting locations around the
state, from Mahwah to Atlantic City.

Always positive and decisive, with a project
manager’s attention to detail, Morris works with his
Satellite Logistics Coordinator to make sure each
Satellite Coordinator gets the list of individuals who
will be attending the meeting at that remote site each
month, so members can be signed in and be confirmed
eligible to claim PDU’s. His prompt answers to logistics
questions and regular communications with the Satellite
Team throughout the month ensure each location is prepared
to host as many as 25 guests for the meeting.

After the event, Morris contacts each
Satellite Coordinator to collect registration forms;
discuss communications or logistics issues; and ensure
continued improvements to this new process. With his
guidance and leadership, the Satellites have grown from a
few small locations with a handful of participants to a
thriving program whose attendance now exceeds registration
at the Main Meeting location.

A PMP and PMINJ member since October, 2010,
Morris first started volunteering as a way to earn extra
PDU’s. Originally he was a Marketing Team volunteer, when
he was asked to assist the Programs Team in a Satellite
Coordinator role, Morris immediately accepted. With his
help as a Coordinator, the team has developed a standard
process for qualifying, setting up, and running satellite
locations. Now the Satellite Team Leader, he reports, “I
enjoy providing an opportunity for PMINJ members to
participate in the monthly Programs and enjoy local
‘networking’ when the Main meeting is not close to where
they live or work. It’s a way to ‘give back’ to PMINJ, and
a great way to ensure that as many members as possible
have access to the monthly Programs.”

PMINJ is a volunteer organization and the
chapter’s success is attributed to volunteers like Morris
who work tirelessly to provide quality service for chapter
membership and we thank him for that.

4Q12 - Beth Hymowitz

Beth is a veteran volunteer for the
Symposium Registration Team. The PMINJ Community relies on
the Registration team to handle on-line registration; send
confirmation emails; distribute all the communications
related to the event; and provide registration coverage on
the day of the event. The symposium team registers more
than 1100 attendees for the two major events each year.
They resolve technical issues related to the on-line
system, questions and quarries from the members and any
cancellation / refund issues. Beth joined the PMINJ
Registration team as a volunteer soon after earning her
PMP in 2007. She chose to volunteer for the Symposium
Registration team because of her prior experience and
interest in event registration processes and being a team
player.

Many PMINJ members are familiar with Beth’s
symposium notices or perhaps she has helped you address a
registration issue. Beth is very prompt responding to any
inquiry related to registration and if she cannot answer,
she will get the request to the appropriate team lead and
assure a response. Beth enjoys working with the other
Registration team members and cites its leaders, as
essential to keeping the Registration system humming!
These team leaders cite Beth’s commitment to the team and
how she always goes the extra mile. Beth sends ‘Thank
You’s to attendees and more recently stepped up to email
the survey for IPM day event. All these activities take up
Beth’s time including weekends.

When she’s not volunteering with the PMINJ
Symposium Registration Team, Beth is an IT Project Manager
at Mars Information Services where she partners with
Business PM’s to advance global multi-segment projects and
she is responsible for their PMO.

The PMINJ chapter cannot run successfully
without the help of dedicated volunteers like Beth. We
appreciate Beth’s hard work and dedication for the chapter
and desire to give back to the PM community.

2011

1Q11 - Dennis Komsa

When you attend PMINJ’s monthly programs,
you will almost always find Dennis Komsa at the sign-in
table ready to help you register for the meeting. In
return for his dedication, strong leadership skills and
proactive efforts as team lead of the On-Site Registration
team, Dennis is being recognized as PMINJ’s Volunteer of
the Quarter.

Dennis became a member of the NJ chapter in
2008 and, in the following year, volunteered to take lead
role for the On-Site Registration team. His strong
leadership skills are evident as he deals with scheduling
his team, now reaching 15 members in size, to ensure that
there is ample registration support for each meeting. As
part of this responsibility, he deals with resolving any
registration issues that are uncovered.

For each of the eight months that PMINJ
holds a dinner meeting, Dennis will insure that there are
sufficient volunteers to work at the meeting’s on-site
registration table. He has demonstrated flexibility in
handling last minute changes in scheduling. With a recent
increase in volunteers, Dennis has improved the scheduling
of team efforts so that each volunteer has some time off
for dinner and networking. Also, Dennis takes
responsibility for bringing the registration supplies and
name tags early to each meeting.

In addition to handling the walk-in
registrations on the evening of the meeting, Dennis
assists in compiling the payment analysis that is done
after registration is completed. He also follows up on
post-meeting issue resolution.

Dennis’ volunteer efforts do not stop with
the PMINJ organization. In addition, Dennis is an active
volunteer with the Somerset County United Way; as a member
of the Resource Development and Marketing Committee, he
heads their Social Media efforts to expand the
organization’s outreach program. He has helped them
establish a presence on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter,
established a blog on MyCentralJersey.com and is currently
in the process of implementing a high school intern
program to lend staffing assistance.

2Q11 - Lisa Blake

Lisa brings more than 25 years of experience
in telecommunication and information systems to her PMINJ
chapter volunteering. She also brings a detail-oriented
and pleasant personality that is needed for the Symposium
Speaker Team. Lisa has been the Team Lead for symposium
speaker team for the past 3 years and has worked
tirelessly, around the year for speaker solicitation,
review and selection. Lisa and her team are instrumental
for creating the final agenda for the May Symposia and the
November IPM Day events. Before becoming speaker team
lead, Lisa served as a speaker angel and was a proactive
member of the team for over a year.

The Symposium Speaker team is the heart of
the symposium. The quality of speakers is the most
important factor for the success of the symposium. There
are significant efforts involved with planning, reviewing,
and interacting with speakers to manage their needs. Lisa
and her co-lead are responsible for soliciting speakers,
collating and reviewing documents from all the speaker
proposals. They check references and lead a team of
volunteer angels through the rigorous speaker selection
process. On the day of the event, Lisa makes sure each
speaker arrives on time, has an assigned angel and
satisfies all their requests.

Lisa’s thoughts on her PMINJ volunteering
experience:
“PMINJ offers a variety of great professional development
opportunities, and volunteering on the Speaker Team for
the Symposium and IPM Day and working to provide the best
experience possible for our Chapter members is my way of
saying "Thank you!" to PMINJ. It's also a fun and
rewarding way to meet and network with other PMs”.

PMINJ's success is attributed to volunteers
like Lisa who work tirelessly to provide quality programs
for the chapter members and we thank her for that.

3Q11 - Suzanne Walsh

Suzanne brings more than 20 years of
experience in Healthcare Information Technology to her
PMINJ chapter volunteering. She also brings a detailed
oriented and pleasant personality that is needed for the
Symposium Registration Team. Suzanne has been the Team
Co-Lead for symposium Registration Team for the past 5
years and has worked tirelessly during the year to
organize and stream line the annual event registration
process. Suzanne and her team are instrumental for the
on-line registration, confirmations, badges and gifts for
attendees for the May Symposiums as well Nov IPM Day
events. Before becoming registration team lead, Suzanne
served as a volunteer on the Registration Team.

The first step for a successful Symposium is
to have smooth registration process. Every year over 600
members register for the May Symposium and over 500
members register for IPM Day Seminar, both online. There
are significant efforts involved for planning, setting up
team and assign responsibilities, setting up dates,
setting up online registration with web master,
continually monitor registration, answering phone calls
related to registration and resolve any issues members
might have registering for the events. On the day of the
event, Suzanne and her team arrives at the facility very
early in the morning to set up registration tables with
gifts and name tags. Due to hard work and dedication of
volunteers like Suzanne, the chapter is able to provide
quality events like symposiums to the members.

Suzanne’s thoughts on her PMINJ volunteering
experience:
“Initially when I joined PMINJ I thought that I would be
able to attend some interesting seminars on Project
Management and keep my PMP certification current. After
attending a few Chapter Events and seeing the quality of
the programs as well as the knowledgeable membership, I
knew I had to be part of the organization and help make
things happen. I am proud and excited to be an active
member of the PMINJ Chapter and encourage everyone to
Volunteer as you not only help the organization, you help
yourself and make many new friends and acquaintances”.

PMINJ is a volunteer organization and
chapter’s success is attributed to volunteers like Suzanne
who works tirelessly to provide quality service for
chapter membership and we thank her for that.

2010

1Q10 - Dave Case

Dave has been a member of the New Jersey
Chapter since 1999 and received his PMP certification in
2002. From 2000 through 2006, Dave was the chapter’s
newsletter editor. He continued to generate the newsletter
even while he was working at the Kennedy Space Center in
Florida. Once he returned to NJ to work at Telcordia
Technologies as a Senior Project Manager, he became the
chapter’s lead photographer.

For the past three years, all the pictures
taken at the monthly meetings and at the May/November
Symposia have been the responsibility of Dave Case. During
this time, he has taken over 1,800 pictures for the
monthly meetings while he and his photo team have shot
over 3,500 pictures for both the May and November events.
A portion of these pictures appear on the chapter’s
website. All of the pictures can be previewed at
www.damaca.smugmug.com/pmi/.

2Q10 - Michael Lange

Michael Lange has been a member of the
Program Evaluation team for 3 years. He has been
consistent with his support. As a team member, Michael is
required to summarize anywhere from 30 to 50 evaluation
forms every month using the team’s MS Excel spreadsheet.
What has set Michael apart is his initiative. Over the
years he has recommended various reporting improvements
and modifications to the spreadsheet calculations which
have resulted in more meaningful data mining.

In addition to his regular monthly
activities of collecting data, Michael recently
volunteered to help the chapter test the use of Survey
Monkey to provide an electronic program evaluation survey
for the satellite locations. Michael created the program
evaluation survey based on the paper version while at the
same time enhancing the electronic version for ease of use
and data entry.

The electronic survey has demonstrated it is
possible for the chapter to go ‘green’ and improve the
satellite location program evaluation reporting. The
electronic evaluation form has reduced handwriting
interpretation issues and reduced the time it takes to
summarize and collate the various question’s answers into
a single master MS Excel spreadsheet report.

Michael continues to provide improvements to
the electronic evaluation form. Two great examples are the
addition of a ‘pointer’ to the PMI.org site upon
completion of the evaluation which serves as a reminder
for program attendees to submit their PDU's and the
addition of check box's for the various volunteer
activities available, making it easier to complete and
faster for chapter leadership to complete data searches.

Michael has helped the program evaluation
team make a difference and provides value added support to
the chapter every day.

2009

1Q09 - Steve Gould

While many students who have taken PMINJ
Chapter’s PMP Exam Prep class are familiar with our
talented instructor team, the class would not be possible
without the tremendous dedication of Steve Gould, a less
visible volunteer who works behind the scenes to ensure
the course runs smoothly and professionally. And although
the instructor team has varied from class to class, Steve
has remained a constant - supporting this class quietly
and relentlessly since 2001.

Steve has multiple responsibilities. All
students receive a large binder of materials that include
a variety of formats. Steve is responsible for
coordinating the printing and distribution of these
materials, using his excellent negotiation skills to find
the lowest price and resolve various problems with
printing facilities. His dedication and flexibility has
enabled smooth transitions over the years as our materials
grew from 500 to 800 pages, from overhead transparencies
to computer-based slides, from hotel sites to formal
training facilities. And on 3 Saturdays of each year for
the past 8 years, no matter the location, no matter the
weather, while the rest of the world is sleeping, Steve is
up at the crack of dawn delivering the handouts to the
class.

But Steve is not the kind of person to let
his responsibilities end at the delivery. He always takes
the extra step to distribute materials during class and
follow-up with diverse student requests, whether to adjust
a thermostat, or replace a light bulb in the LCD
projector; he's even moved walls in training rooms. No
matter the situation, Steve always embodies the PMP Code
of Conduct by treating everyone with courtesy and respect.
While tensions may rise, he remains a cool and calming
presence, and always gets the job done.

Probably the most difficult of his
responsibilities is maintaining version control of the
materials. Because different instructors customize their
sections, or the PMBOK undergoes revisions, or updates are
made in the spirit of continuous improvement, there are
always changes being made. Therefore managing the version
control is an absolute essential element. It is a very
difficult task, and like everything else, Steve handles it
with aplomb and good humor. Steve's relentless dedication
makes the chapter’s PMP Prep Course a best in class
offering.

2Q09 - Maureen Sammis

Maureen Sammis has been a member of the New
Jersey Chapter since 1992, when she achieved her PMP
status. She has been a role model of a volunteer for more
than 7 years, mainly supporting the Symposium and the
International Project Management Day events with
communications. She has also contributed two poster
presentations to chapter symposia.

The Symposium Communications Team that
Maureen leads is our connection to the world. The role has
grown through the years. Currently, Maureen’s team
develops content and writes articles for the chapter web
site, for specific e-mail notifications, for chapter
newsletters, and for PMI News articles. These pieces of
journalism involve pre-event and post-event objectives,
and rely on input from the entire Symposium Team.
Maureen’s team takes feedback gracefully, while meeting
the deadlines. You know what is going on with upcoming
symposium and International Project Management Day events,
thanks to Maureen and her team members.

Maureen spent 35 years of her career with
AT&T. For her last 5 years, she was the Vice President
of Customer Service, serving large business customers with
worldwide networks. She was one of the first executives on
the AT&T Project Management Organization board. After
retiring from AT&T in 2004, Maureen has taken on new
challenges. She currently consults for Creative Resources,
interfacing with customers in the gourmet food industry to
design, develop, and deliver custom packaging, which is
created in China. Her extensive project management skills,
as well as her communication and diplomacy skills, are
used daily.

3Q09 - Barbara Fuller

Volunteer extraordinaire would best describe
Barbara Fuller. Barbara has been a member of the New
Jersey Chapter since 2001. Barbara has been a PMP for over
10 years.

She has been actively involved in leading
the Career Networking Group since 2006. Under Barbara’s
direction, she has transformed the Career Networking Group
from chapter members in transition searching for a job to
a true networking forum. In addition to providing a venue
for chapter members to network with each other, Barbara
has been very instrumental in bringing in speakers to
educate and motivate. Speakers have coached Career
Networking Group members in the art of communication, as
well as boosting confidence. Group members and
participants have truly mastered the art of networking
that goes well beyond job search. The group meets at 5:30
prior to regularly scheduled chapter meetings each month.
By attending these meetings and sessions, members have
learned how to create a resume that gets a second look,
honed interviewing skills and perfected the effective 30
second elevator pitch.

Barbara was the program manger for the
Seminar @ Sea event in 2008. It was the first time such an
event was offered by the New Jersey Chapter and Barbara
accepted and rose to the challenge! She worked tirelessly
to negotiate contracts with suppliers, including the
cruise ship, attract sponsors to participate in the event,
secure dynamic speakers, and provide a venue of overall
fun. Barbara successfully achieved a mix of fun and
learning to all participants’ satisfaction.

Most recently Barbara program managed the
successful Career Workshop held at Rutgers University this
past June. The theme of the workshop was getting your
career in shape for summer. In addition to securing
Rutgers School of Business as a host/sponsor and inviting
career coaches, Barbara also taught an elevator pitch
session herself.

After completing her undergraduate and
graduate education in Ohio, she relocated to Dallas, Texas
and soon connected with AT&T where she worked for 21
years. To take on additional challenges as an in-house
consultant, AT&T relocated her to New Jersey. While at
AT&T, Barbara held various positions of increasing
responsibility focused on program and project delivery.
Her final assignment at AT&T was establishing and
running a PMO. Her work there caused a transformation in
the information technology organization; the people, the
processes and the client perception.

Barbara left AT&T to pursue her own
business within the project management consulting arena.
Her company is called Process and Project Solutions, Inc..
She has successfully built her client base utilizing
project management skills to manage large scale
initiatives for customers or to provide process or project
consulting expertise. Recently she formed a professional
and personal coaching business for individuals,
entrepreneurs and companies called “Focus on You, Now”. It
embraces her passion of developing people and teams using
her many years of coaching experience.

When asked about her successes whether in
her corporate life, as an entrepreneur or a leader of
volunteers, she recognizes the talent, and excellence of
the people on the teams she has led.

4Q09 - Sandy Sandlin

Sandy Sandlin has been named our Volunteer
of the Quarter. Sandy works with the Programs' Evaluation
Team to streamline the process and to make it easier for
everyone to review the results. The team that he is
leading tabulates survey results from each of the eight
monthly meetings held each year:

Around 175 - 200 people at the main site

10 - 25 people at each of the satellite locations

There are currently satellite sites in
Camden, Fairfield, Iselin, Princeton, and Roseland. While
the amount of work is steadily increasing, the team is
looking for ways to provide the results quickly. Through
Sandy's efforts, the Evaluation Team is a strong team
which always remains positive and willing to help.

2008

1Q08 - Kelly Rasmussen

For years, she has been a great asset to the
PMI NJ Chapter successfully supporting the monthly
meetings, the Annual Symposium, PMP training class,
International Project Management day, and more. Kelly
started volunteering as the Project Manager – On-Line
Registration in 2004. At that time, there was a project
manager responsible for manual registration and one for
on-line registration. Due to her diligence and willingness
to please, this volunteer position has expanded. Starting
this year, registration is only available through the
on-line registration and therefore the entire registration
process is her responsibility.

She works behind the scenes to ensure that
the online registration system runs smoothly and the
resulting list of registrants is correct. She is the one
who you contact if you encounter such issues as your
password for the on-line registration system is suddenly
no longer valid or if you never received an e-mail message
indicating that your registration was accepted by the
system. In addition, she maintains the list of those
individuals who decided to take advantage of registering
for the 8 meetings to be held during the program year in
September and checks that the final registration list is
accurate. She also creates the formatted registration list
used by the On-Site Registration Team and Career
Networking Program Group as well as the one for generating
the name tags for each evening meeting. She trained
someone to print the name tags and serves as the backup to
this position.

In addition, Kelly has become in many cases
the first point of contact for not only questions related
to Programs registration but also the other events
sponsored by our chapter. She takes the time to find the
appropriate individual to respond directly to each
member’s inquiries. Given all of Kelly's efforts to
support the chapter, Kelly is well deserving of this
PMI/NJ "Volunteer of the Quarter” recognition.

3Q08 - Eileen Szperka

Eileen Szperka brings more than 30 years of
experience in health care, financial, clinical and
management information systems to her PMI NJ chapter
volunteering. She also brings a can-do attitude and
terrific people skills, which are needed on the Symposium
Facilities Team. Eileen has been the Team Lead for
Facilities for the past 3 symposium events, including new
locations with record-setting attendance. Before that,
Eileen was a proactive member of the Symposium Facilities
Team for over a year.

The Symposium Facilities Team is where the
rubber hits the road. There are significant planning as
well as execution and closing activities, and tremendous
amounts of interdependencies to be managed. Eileen is
responsible for selecting the symposium locations,
negotiating the facilities, A/V, and hotel contracts,
addressing the changing needs of speakers and vendors,
providing the essential layout diagrams that help
attendees navigate the events easily, ensuring that the
A/V is perfect and has back-ups, and most importantly,
that the food part of the experience is excellent both in
terms of quality and service. As we have more events and
events get longer and more complicated in terms of
programs, the challenges of the Facilities Team increase,
but Eileen has built a strong team and mentored a co-lead,
which will help us continue in this area with excellence.

Eileen’s thoughts on her PMI NJ volunteering
experience:
“After passing my PMP Certification in July, 2005, I
decided that I didn’t want to belong to an organization
and not be active. Then I went to the PMI NJ November
Symposium and was so impressed with the group that I
signed-up to be on a committee. Since then I have been
active on the Facilities Team for the Symposium, first as
a team member and in 2007 as Team Lead.
Although working on the Facilities Team can be challenging
at times, it is very rewarding when things come together
and you hear from the attendees that it is the best event
they have attended. Volunteering has broadened my
understanding of how project management impacts other
industries. It allows you to network with people you might
otherwise not have met. I have had the chance to be
mentored by some individuals that I see as role models and
I have developed friendships that I know will last.”

4Q08 - Jane Banfield

Countless contributions were made by
volunteers on the 2007-2008 PMI/NJ Programs team.

While everyone worked hard to make these
meetings successful, Jane Banfield efforts have been
instrumental in the success of the programs.

Besides working with the caterers and the
audiovisual contacts, she has also interacted closely with
the satellite sites to ensure that the people in these
locations are able to hear what is going on at the
meetings as well having the ability to ask questions. This
has resulted in her visiting the main meeting locations
and arriving at the main location the day of the meeting
anywhere from mid afternoon to a couple of hours before
the start of the meeting. She has spent hours working with
the audiovisual contact at the main meeting location
adjusting the equipment to improve the sound quality. Due
to her patience and attention to detail, the attendees at
the satellite locations have had very good experiences. In
fact, the contact for the Marlton location sent a note to
the Board thanking us for our efforts.

2007

4Q07 - Harry Chiovarou

Being “The A/V Guy” is one of those jobs
that if done well, is in fact invisible! So, many of you
may not know Harry the way the PMI NJ Symposium Planning
Team does! But join us in recognizing Harry as our first
"Volunteer of the Quarter”. We are starting this form of
recognition to show our appreciation for some invaluable
team players, without whom our events would not be
successful.

Harry joined our Facilities Team as the
point person for audio-visual needs in 2004. He has now
successfully supported 5 major events at four different
locations! Every space has different challenges in terms
of ensuring that the speaker can be seen and heard by
everyone in the audience. He is responsible to solicit,
select, manage, and work with subcontractors. There are
the technology unknowns! And there is the holding your
breath phenomenon on the day of the event, in between
responding to calls to fix a microphone that has suddenly
stopped working or other glitch. In all of this, Harry has
shown leadership, patience, perseverance, adherence to the
highest standards of quality, and, yes, good cheer! For
this we honor him!

Harry can only recall “one time when there
was a potential for problems. It was before the 2006
Symposium, when the in-house A/V contractor could not get
the dual projectors working in the General Session room.
He was up until about 1:00 AM trying to fix it. Luckily
the technician who came at 6:00 AM was able to fix the
problem.” And no one except the planning team knew about
it!

Harry recommends volunteering to chapter
members: “Volunteering is not only a good way to get PDUs,
it is also good for getting noticed and for networking.
I’m glad the chapter has given me the opportunity to do
something I enjoy.”

Stop by at the upcoming IPM Day Event
November 1 or at next May’s Symposium to let Harry know
what a great contribution he is making!